Economic Analysis of Thermal–Catalytic Process of Palm Oil (Elaeis guineesensis, Jacq) and Soap Phase Residue from Neutralization Process of Palm Oil (Elaeis guineensis, Jacq)

Abstract

Palm oil is, from an economic, environmental, and social point of view, a vegetable oil with great potential and the state of Pará-Brazil is Brazil’s great producer. In addition, soap phase residue or palm oil neutralization sludge (PONS), a byproduct of the neutralization step of the chemical refinement of palm oil, is produced, posing a huge problem for waste disposal and management in the production process of refined palm oil (RPO). In this context, this work aims to systematically investigate the economic analysis of the thermal–catalytic process of crude palm oil (CPO) and palm oil neutralization sludge (PONS). The thermocatalytic processes of CPO and PONS carried out at pilot scale and their economic feasibility were analyzed. The yields of biofuels produced by fractional distillation were also presented. The physicochemical properties of CPO and PONS, as well as those of organic liquid products obtained by the thermal–catalytic process of CPO and PONS were taken into account in the economic analysis. In addition, the chemical composition organic liquid products obtained by thermal–catalytic process of CPO and PONS, as well as its distillation fractions (green gasoline, green kerosene, green light diesel and heavy diesel), used as key factors/indicators on the economic analysis. The analysis of the key factors/indicators from the thermocatalytic processes of CPO and PONS showed economic viability for both crude palm oil (Elaeis guineensis, Jacq) and palm oil neutralization sludge. The minimum fuel selling price (MFSP) obtained in this work for the biofuels was 1.59 USD/L using crude palm oil (CPO) and 1.34 USD/L using palm oil neutralization sludge (PONS). The best breakeven point obtained was of 1.24 USD/L considering the PONS. The sensibility analysis demonstrated that the pyrolysis and distillation yields are the most important variables that affect the minimum fuel-selling price (MFSP) in both economic analyses.